Most wickets taken by a player in a Test match innings (male)

New Zealand’s left-arm spinner Ajaz Patel (b. India) re-wrote the Test-match record books on 3-4 December 2021, taking all 10 of India’s first-innings wickets at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium. Making a triumphant return to his birthplace, Patel was just the third player to bag all 10 wickets in a Test innings, after England’s James Charles “Jim” Laker (1922-86), with 10 for 53 against Australia at Old Trafford, Manchester, UK, on 30-31 July 1956, and India’s Anil Kumble, with 10 for 74 against Pakistan at Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium (now Arun Jaitley Stadium) in Delhi, India, on 7 February 1999.

Laker: 51.2 overs, 23 maidens, 53 runs, 10 wickets (2 bowled, 2 lbw, 6 caught); Kumble: 26.3 overs, 9 maidens, 74 runs, 10 wickets (2 bowled, 3 lbw, 5 caught); Patel: 47.5 overs, 12 maidens, 119 runs, 10 wickets (2 bowled, 3 lbw, 5 caught).

In the first innings of the same match at Old Trafford, Laker famously took 9 for 37 as Australia were bundled out for 84 and forced to follow on 375 runs behind England’s first innings score of 459. Laker’s 10 for 53 in Australia’s second innings produced match figures of 19 for 90 (in 68 overs) – the most wickets taken by a player in a Test match (male). Kumble’s first innings bowling performance against Pakistan in Delhi was less spectacular, but still produced 4 for 75 as he ripped out the middle order. His match figures were 14 for 149 off 51 overs. Patel followed up his 10 for 119 with 4 for 106 in India’s second innings, for match figures of 14 for 225 off 73.5 overs. Despite Patel’s first-innings heroics, New Zealand – all out for 62 in their first innings – were routed by 372 runs in Mumbai as India took the two-match series 1-0.

In the history of men’s Test cricket – 2,438 matches played between 15 March 1877 and 6 December 2021 – Laker, Kumble and Patel are the only players to dismiss all 10 opposition batsmen in an innings, although on 17 occasions a bowler has claimed nine wickets, including Laker at Old Trafford and leading Test wicket-taker Muttiah Muralitharan twice (1998 and 2002).